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The Origin Story of MusicConstructED
When Sarah and I first started working together over 20 years ago in Iowa City, we would get together on Friday nights with two other colleagues to chit-chat about music education and how to better reach our students, jokingly referring to ourselves as “general music curriculum junkies.” As the years passed, we led curriculum writing projects for our district and spent countless hours refining our own instructional practices.
In 2016, when I won 40 Waterman Ukes from Kala online (thank you, Kala!), we again put our heads together to create materials for our students. We wanted to figure out how to authentically use the ukulele with an Orff curriculum and not just as an instrument to accompany singing. When we discovered that there were not any resources available for Ukulele and Orff, we published a book, Strum, Strike, Sing, Play: Artfully Adding Ukulele to the General Music Classroom. Sarah also published a research article for the Orff Echo about this idea.
We have always appreciated the network of general music teachers with whom we work in our district, but we know this is not the reality for most teachers! We believed that all dedicated general music teachers deserved a place to network with each other, share their ideas, and engage in professional development specifically designed for the unique and specialized work we do.
In 2018, we started creating a website and exploring options to offer professional development but quickly realized that the resources required to create this platform were beyond our reach while we were still working full-time as music educators. So, we started researching other ways to accomplish this same goal while remaining in our roles as educators.
Serendipitously, at a dinner conversation in February 2020, Sarah discovered that Robin Walenta, the CEO of West Music, shared a similar vision of providing exceptional resources to general music teachers, including curriculum, continuing education, and products sold by West Music. With Sarah’s and my years of teaching experience and West Music’s support, the idea behind Music ConstructED was born.
Working with a small team of dedicated West Music employees, we began brainstorming our joint vision. Throughout the spring and into summer, we envisioned a safe space to network and learn, focused on the general music teachers and their professional needs.
Music ConstructED launched its website just 7 months later, in September 2020, containing 100 articles and lesson plans related to General Music. One year later, in 2021, we launched our Professional Development series, including PD Bites (short, 30-minute sessions) and Pedagogical Perspectives, 60-90 minute workshops on various topics.
In 2022, we offered our set of first graduate courses on our custom-built Learning Management System where students can take self-paced graduate credits that count towards a Masters of Education Degree with Colorado State University-Pueblo, or another university program of their choice.
We continue to dream of new ways to serve general music educators and provide resources and opportunities to support their work. When asked, “Why are we so passionate about this work?” Our response is as simple as the quote from Emma Watson in 2014.
“If not me, who? If not now, when?”
If you’re interested in joining our community, you can learn more about what we do in the Learning Center of the catalog and across our website. Come join music teachers from across the globe and find the support and inspiration you have been looking for.
Perusing articles featured in the Learning Center, found on pages 140-145 of West Music’s 2022-23 catalog, is a great way to get oriented to the breadth and quality of general music education resources that are literally at your fingertips. So what are you waiting for?
Blog Post Contributors: Kate Hagen and Sarah Fairfield